Is Resegregation Real

Analysis by the Civil Rights Project has shown that the isolation of Latino and black students from white students in public schools has substantially increased since the l980s. These findings have been criticized recently in a report by the Mumford Center at the University at Albany, Resegregation in American Public Schools? Not in the 1990s and in Abigail and Stephen Thernstrom's book, No Excuses: Closing the Racial Gap in Learning. The Mumford report argues that the increased isolation is not caused by public policy, but by demographic trends and hence, it is misleading to label these trends as resegregation. The Thernstroms claim that black and white students in our public schools have become much less separated over the past thirty years or so. Furthermore, they argue that the existing racial imbalance in schools should come as no surprise given the reality of residential preferences and differences in family income. This paper seeks to address these criticisms, clarify the findings of the Civil Rights Project at Harvard University, and reaffirm the Project's conclusion that black and Latino isolation has indeed increased, not only because of demographic trends but also because of public policy changes. (Contains 2 tables and 20 notes.)

Descriptors: African American Students, Public Schools, Civil Rights, Family Income, School Resegregation, Racial Composition, Public Policy, White Students, Hispanic American Students, School Segregation, Demography, Place of Residence, Socioeconomic Influences, Social Isolation, Minority Groups, School Districts